Unexpected Hobby: Dried Flowers
Last year during the pandemic I picked up a new and frankly unexpected hobby.
Dried Flowers
Embracing feminine energy
Why unexpected? Generally speaking, my hobbies and interests are on the masculine side. I used to spend countless hours practicing parkour, I enjoy climbing rusty buildings to get to the highest point, my favorite subject in school was P.E… you get the point.
Once the pandemic commenced I became an unprofessional hermit. Yes, I was frightful to go outdoors especially as a New York dweller and was afraid to get a friend sick. So I stayed inside for most of the days. On the flipside this also made me appreciate what I usually take more for granted. One of those things was the flowers growing out on the streets, in the park. Maybe the creative in me was looking for a new adventure, but this further appreciation for flowers led me to venture into making dried flowers and pressed flowers. This pandemic allowed an opportunity for me to step a little more towards my feminine energy.
After some months of experimenting I purchased some baby’s breath from a local market and successfully made a dried edition of them after two short weeks. It was quite a simple process. Now it adds a lot of home and photo joy into my life. The wonderful part about these dried flowers is that not only can they make soft home decor but they also serve as reusable photo props! When I say reusable, believe me they last unless you smush them, please refrain from doing that.
Go longevity.
The following are some photos created with them. Enjoy!
All of the photos are taken on medium format film, Portra 400.
The models are my good friend as well as phenomenal model Tenzing Kalden from MMG.
Any questions? Feel free to drop them in the comments below.
Cheers,
Masumi